At the time of painting this elephant piece there was yet another story of elephants fighting for their survival. It is hard to understand how this large-sized species are so sophisticated and gentle and yet they are persecuted by humans in search of ivory. They also have fights amongst themselves, in which many lose part of their tusks. With all this I decided to present them as "Mono No Aware" , a Japanese expression for beautiful sadness. - Robert Bissell.